


dead week? more like dead and weak

by untrustworthyglitch



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Finals Week, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-08
Updated: 2017-12-08
Packaged: 2019-02-11 23:13:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12946095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/untrustworthyglitch/pseuds/untrustworthyglitch
Summary: It's dead week. Finals are looming, and there's something frantic in the air.





	dead week? more like dead and weak

**Author's Note:**

> brought to you by the fact that i have six finals, a final presentation, a final portfolio, and four quizzes due in the next seven days! also featuring the weird fixation college kids have with study rooms at the library because that shit is literally the hunger games. do not come between a group of tired, stressed, frantic students and a study room on the day before finals. do. not.
> 
> written before i remembered that my dorm with its private bathroom is an outlier and should not have been counted, so pls disregard the illogical nature of a private dorm bathroom. proofread one whole time.
> 
> comments? questions? wanna shout at me about youtube and the mcelboys? head on down to untrustworthyglitch.tumblr.com and say hey! maybe if i survive finals week i'll say hey back!

Magnus wakes up at four o’clock in the afternoon, stares at the ceiling for a few minutes, and longs for his own demise.

He doesn’t move for a few minutes. Instead he glances around the room, at the puddle of sunlight on the worn carpet, at the teetering pile of textbooks no one has opened since tearing the online access code from the inside covers, at the five dirty mugs that have been sitting on the floor since last Tuesday. He sighs.

He can hear quiet breathing from the bunk under his, which means Taako is still asleep, although they might be past “still” and verging onto “already.” For all Magnus knows Taako could have gotten up at a reasonable hour, hit the gym, eaten some shitty dining hall food, and crashed back into bed for a quick power nap. Except this is Taako he’s talking about, which means that he definitely has not been upright at all in the past twelve hours. For as much as he claims to not need sleep, Taako sure can rock a coma.

“You were going over your vocab in your sleep,” Merle says from across the room. Magnus sits up, because now that Merle definitely knows he’s awake it’s only a matter of time until they rouse Taako and go on the hunt for something baring resemblance to sustenance. 

“Was I doing it right?” he asks.

Merle puts down his stack of notecards and shrugs. “Hell if I know. I don’t really go in for that anatomy bullshit.”

“Unless it’s plant anatomy,” Magnus grumbles, and Merle puts his hands in the air. Or rather, he puts his hand in the air. Hand, singular. The prosthetic is nowhere to be found, which means Merle either just woke up or is about to go to bed, both of which are equally acceptable. 

“Call it like you see it,” Merle says, and then, “Wake up sleeping beauty so we can eat.”

“Why can’t you wake him up?” Magnus complains, but swings down off his bunk anyway. Taako is fast asleep, curled around not one but two body pillows, under a mountain of quilts and throws and is that Magnus’ hoodie? Oh, he is definitely reclaiming that. He reaches forward to do so, not bothering to be gentle. The objective is to wake up Taako, so gentleness be damned.

Taako blinks himself awake slowly at first, but then sits bolt upright when he realizes that Magnus is halfway through stealing back his hoodie. 

“Hey, big guy, what’s the idea?” he half-shouts, digging perfectly manicured nails into soft fabric. Magnus stops pulling at once. No way is he gonna risk ripping the hoodie. It’s a damn good hoodie.

“Merle says it’s time for lunch,” Magnus says. He furrows his brow. “Dinner? Or have we cycled all the way to breakfast?”

“I don’t care, I’m sleeping,” Taako says firmly, and flops back onto the bed.

There’s a curse and the sound of a hand smacking flesh, and Lup sits up.

“I’m trying to sleep here,” she says accusingly, glaring at Taako, who only laughs.

“So that’s where you went,” he says, and Lup groans. She flings her sleep-ruined braid over her shoulder and moves as if to climb over her brother, but Taako grabs her ankle and yanks her back down. She makes a noise somewhere between angry cat and startled screech owl, but Taako doesn’t seem to hear it. He’s too busy shoving his sister into the wall while vaulting out of bed and making a beeline for the en suite bathroom, calling over his shoulder, “I live here so I get first dibs! If you want hot water you should go wake Barold.”

“Maybe I will,” Lup gripes, and sits up. She swings her legs over the bed but makes no move to stand, content to blink sleepily at Magnus a few times until her attention is caught by an open textbook on the floor. She picks it up and thumbs through it slowly, skimming.

“That’s Merle’s evolutionary biology textbook,” Magnus says, and Lup hums contemplatively.

When he’d first moved into this dorm his freshman year, there’d been about a month of confusion and discomfort at having a roommate who came as part of a package deal. Taako, aloof and sarcastic, had definitely been a huge asshole, and finding out that there was another Taako somewhere on campus had nearly given Magnus a heart attack. But then he’d met Lup, and realized that at least half of Taako’s dickish behavior came from a childhood of having exactly one person in his entire life, and that had maybe tugged on Magnus’ heartstrings a little more than he’d have liked to admit. So, he’d dealt with it. And then they’d lived together sophomore year, and now they’re in their third year of undergrad, and Taako isn’t going anywhere, and neither is his twin sister.

Merle had been a surprise. Some kind of filing error had lead to two junior-level dudes getting a third roommate when they’d specifically requested a double room, which was technically fine. They could handle that. Not every housing request could be honored, after all. What they didn’t expect was for their third roommate to be a dude finishing his master’s degree in botany, of all things.

“I thought grad students weren’t supposed to live in this dorm,” Magnus had said.

“I thought so too, but it’s cheaper this way, so,” Merle had replied, shrugging, and that had been the end of it. Dos Horny Boys became Tres Horny Boys, and no one filed any paperwork to get things sorted out, and now Magnus has a willowy dude with a twin sister and a gruff guy with something bordering on a plant fetish as roommates. It’s chill.

“Taako, hurry up so we can eat!” Lup calls.

“Fuck off!” Taako shouts back, and Magnus gets the distinct impression that he’s giving them two middle fingers right now, even through the wall. There’s the sound of the shower turning off and the usual clatter of Taako dropping several bottles of expensive hair care product, and then he calls, “You could always go without me. I’m good here.”

“Nah, I need someone to complain about the food with,” Lup says.

“I can complain about food,” Magnus says, and she looks at him with pity.

“Don’t get me wrong, it’s lovely that you try, but last weekend you put hot sauce and ranch dressing on some ramen and called it buffalo chicken flavored, so I think you know where I’m going with this,” she says, and yeah, Magnus totally gets her drift. She’s wrong about the buffalo chicken ramen, though. That shit’s choice.

The bathroom door opens in a cloud of steam, and how did Taako even get the water that hot in such a short amount of time? Didn’t he, like, just go in there? Either way, he emerges, hair still dripping and shirt unbuttoned, and motions Lup toward the bathroom.

“Ladies second,” he drawls, and she smacks him at like 45% power when she passes. He laughs and flops onto his bed, tugging fingers through wet hair in the process of something that might possibly end up as a braid.

“Have we heard from anyone else?” Magnus asks. “Like, did anyone else survive last night?”

“Big guy, I don’t think I survived last night,” Taako laughs.

“Lucretia texted to say that one of us must have taken her notebook, and she wants it back,” Merle says. He hasn’t moved from the couch since, which kinda makes Magnus’ skin crawl, because they’d found that couch abandoned out back of the dorm during move-in week and hadn’t really ever bothered to clean it at all. It was a miracle they could cram it into their dorm in the first place, but Taako had been dead-set on having “a spot for couch makeout sessions when you two chucklefucks are out of town, ya dig?” so they’d managed. 

“Which notebook?” Magnus asks.

Merle makes a noncommittal gesture with his hand. “I dunno. She just said she wants her notebook back.”

“Is it this one?” Taako suggests, rummaging around in the mountain of blankets and pillows on his bed. He frowns, but grins when he finds a small notebook, blue with Lucretia’s name embossed on the cover. He holds it out to Merle, who makes a facial expression that means he really doesn’t know, Taako, please quit asking.

“Where did that come from?” Magnus asks, not sure if he really wants the answer.

“Not sure,” Taako says. “I woke up at some point last night with it poking me in the ribs, but I don’t know how long it’s been there.”

Magnus opens his mouth to ask a question, but stops himself. “You know what? It doesn’t matter how it got there. It’s dead week. Anything goes.”

“Now you’re getting it,” Taako says, and pulls a few blankets aside until he finds a hoodie, which he pulls on while glaring at Magnus. It’s Magnus’ hoodie.

“Hey, that’s my hoodie,” Lup says from the open bathroom door, and Magnus doesn’t even have the energy to sigh. He’s been awake for less than half an hour and the sun is already setting and he hasn’t eaten anything in almost twenty-four hours. What he needs is a fuckton of carbs and a quiet place to go back to studying and then five years of sleep, in that order.

“Can we go?” Merle asks, impatient despite still not having moved from the couch.

“Somebody text Killian and Carey,” Lup says. She’s already halfway out the door, mascara in hand, hair in a messy bun. The boys hurry to follow, because if there’s one thing they all know, it’s that Lup is very easy to lose track of. She’d vanished for nearly a week last summer just because they took their eyes off her for slightly too long. Poor Barry had almost worried himself into an early grave, but then she’d turned up, lovely as ever, with a long and winding tale of getting lost while going spelunking. 

“When did they go home?” Magnus asks. “I don’t remember them leaving.”

“You fell asleep on your anatomy notes and the twins wouldn’t quit bickering, so they abandoned ship around two,” Merle tells him. 

“Smart,” Magnus says. 

The rest of the walk to the closest dining hall passes in silence save for Taako complaining loudly and repeatedly about how cold it is and then refusing to admit that he should have put on warmer clothes. Lup teases him mercilessly, and they don’t take long to launch into a full-scale Nonverbal Sibling Fight™ complete with glares and occasional eye rolling. Magnus doesn’t get involved. He’s been dealing with those two and their dynamic long enough to stay far, far away from any and all bickering, regardless of how friendly it may seem.

The dining hall is fairly empty, and it doesn’t take long to amass a pile of subpar food and stake a claim on the largest table they can get their hands on. Avi from Magnus’ physics class is asleep on a table a few feet away, but no one makes a move to wake him. He’ll be fine. By the looks of the stack of notes he’s drooling onto, he could use the sleep.

“I fucking hate dead week,” Lup groans, busying herself with trying to put enough salt on a handful of potato wedges that maybe they’ll be edible.

“I had to explain dead week to Angus the other day,” Taako says. He rolls his eyes, aiming for annoyed but landing somewhere around fond of his mentee. “Kid didn’t get why the week before finals would be a living hell. He just fuckin’ loves exams.”

“Nerd,” Lup snickers. 

“Are you talking about Angus?” Killian asks, dropping into one of the empty chairs. Carey is with her, with matching dark circles under her eyes. Neither of them has any actual food, but Killian is clutching a Red Bull like she might die if she lets go of it and Carey is holding the biggest coffee Magnus has ever seen, so they’re definitely good. 

“Yep,” Taako replies, popping the _p._

“Haven’t seen him around much,” Carey says.

“That’s because he’s a literal child? He’s not supposed to be hanging around a college campus all the time,” Taako says.

“He really likes the science buildings,” Magnus says, and Taako levels a glare on him with enough force that Magnus can almost feel his excellent facial hair beginning to wilt. 

“Sorry, I didn’t know you were the one in charge of my kid.” Taako has both eyebrows raised in what Magnus really hopes is mock outrage rather than actual outrage.

“You do know he’s not your actual son, right?” Merle laughs. “He’s your, what, court-appointed mentee? Your permanent pain in the ass?”

“He’s technically my mentee through a mandatory volunteer experience that I do not, in any way, shape, or form, want to be a part of, but for all intents and purposes he is my son and I will kill to protect him,” Taako says, and takes a dainty bite of some lukewarm mashed potatoes.

“Why are you doing the program if you hate it so much?” Killian asks, and chugs the fuck outta that Red Bull. Magnus is impressed.

“I need it for grad school.” Taako says the words _grad school_ with the same inflection one might use for _federal prison,_ or maybe _bigoted in-laws’ house on Thanksgiving._

“Gross,” Carey says, and they lapse into pleasant conversation about absolutely nothing of consequence. The way Magnus figures it, they have about an hour before they need to be hunting down a group study lounge for the night, maybe less depending on when the academic fraternities decide to mobilize. That means they have an hour, maybe less, to be actual human beings instead of book-dwelling information creatures.

“Hey, where’s Barry?” Magnus says when he finally realizes that there are still two empty chairs at their table. 

“He and Krav had a project,” Taako says with a dismissive wave of his hand. “Or at least, I think they did? I dunno, I was asleep for a long time. For all I know, that was last Friday, and they’ve been missing for a week.”

“Nah, Barry’s supposed to help us find a study space tonight, but he hasn’t been texting me back, so I’m not sure what’s up,” Lup says. She uses a fork to mush the remains of what was probably supposed to be some kind of rice dish and makes a face in disgust. 

“Speaking of study space, I overheard Lucas Miller saying something about how his shitty science frat is going to be trying to get into study rooms early tonight, so we should probably get a move on,” Carey says. 

“But it’s Saturday,” Merle protests. “Lucretia said the library wouldn’t open spaces until later on.”

Killian shrugs. “All I know is what I heard the nerdlord say. Take it or leave it.”

“Oh, we’re taking it. And by _it_ I mean the best study room we can get our gay little hands on,” Taako says with determination.

“Uh, can I get my bisexual big hands on it?” Magnus asks, and Taako shrugs.

“Depends on who gets to it first,” he says, and moves to stand. “It’s almost five-thirty. We need to move out.”

“Don’t forget to use the group chat!” Lup says, with a pointed look at Merle, who cannot use the group chat to save his life. He doesn’t seem to notice, and Lup visibly stifles a sigh before giving the table double middle fingers and dashing off in the direction of the library.

“Well, she’s headed for the library, but she’ll probably need backup,” Killian says. She grabs her girlfriend’s hand and makes to haul her in the direction of the library without a backward glance. Magnus sighs, looks down at his hands, and stands up.

“Do we trust them to actually nab a study room, or should we follow them?” he asks.

Taako mulls it over. “Lup is crafty, but easily swayed by monetary bribes. I’d say we follow them.”

The walk to the library is quick in the gathering dusk, but Taako spends the entire time shivering, which gets Magnus’ protective instinct going. He’d offer Taako his hoodie, but he just stole it back that morning, and he’s kinda loathe to part with it so soon. Maybe tomorrow, if the dumbass still refuses to put on a real coat, he’ll offer. 

The instant they open the doors, Merle whistles. “Damn. Busy.”

It seems that a large portion of the student body has had the same idea about getting to the library early and are now milling about the wide foyer on the first floor. Magnus spots Carey and Killian over by the far wall, but Lup is lost in the crowd despite being simultaneously tall, beautiful, and loud. Magnus can’t see her anywhere.

His phone buzzes in his pocket, and when he takes it out he sees a text from Lup.

_if you see that jackass greg pls tell him to pay me my fucking money_

Another message buzzes in, this time from Lucretia.

_Are you in the library? Because I sure wish I wasn’t. This is the nightmare scenario._

Magnus types out a reply.

_How many people do you think I’m going to have to murder to actually get a study room_

The response is from Taako, and features several emojis, mostly the middle finger.

_all of them please. start with barbra. he’s been getting on my nerves._

Magnus looks around and sure enough there’s Barbra, leaning on a wall between two dudes he thinks are both named Jerry. All of them look like they think they look cool, and maybe they do? A little bit. It’s that subtle badboy gang vibe, coupled with motorcycle jackets and some very stylishly mussed hair. 

The next several messages are from Killian.

_is Barbra here?_  
_I hate that guy_  
_he totally tried to sabotage Sloane at the roller derby_  
_fuck that guy_  
_ugh_

Magnus puts his phone in his pocket in favor of actually using his perception skills. Granted, he’s not always the best at actually perceiving things, but he can usually get the basics. Right now they need all eyes to be on the desks, where pretty soon Lucretia and her coworkers will open up slots for group study rooms. And Magnus is definitely getting into one of those rooms, even if it kills him.

“I don’t know why our dear Madame Director couldn’t just save a room for us,” Taako huffs, brushing hair out of his eyes. His braid is starting to come undone, helped along by the stiff wind they’d walked through on their way over. 

“It’s against protocol,” Merle complains in his most mocking tone of voice. 

Just then, Magnus’ phone buzzes a frightening amount of times, and he takes it out with only a slight spark of panic. There are a flurry of messages from Lup.

_shit shit shit_  
_they opened up sign ups without me noticing_  
_fuck i think they’re already full_  
_why don’t we have a bigger library_  
_dammit hold on_  
_nope definitely full ___  
_f u c k_  
_so whose room are we invading instead since this building is packed to the max_

____

____

Magnus sighs. He knows good and well that they’re going to end up in his room, because everyone else has roommates who don’t always take kindly to their big cluster of loudmouths. Every other finals week, they’d ended up packing every single one of them into the room he shared with Taako and camping out for a week at a time, emerging only for sustenance and, on the last night, a fuckton of booze. It hadn’t been ideal, and now there are not one but three couples in the mix, so Magnus is pretty sure he’d rather be strangled to death by a sizeable jellyfish than have to deal with a room full of those chucklefucks for any extended period of time.

His phone vibrates again, and this time it’s a message from Kravitz, who until that point had been suspiciously silent. It’s a picture of an empty study room, and the message says something that simultaneously makes Magnus’ heart stop and sends him to a higher plane of existence.

_Third floor. Have some faith, will you?_

They book it for the stairs, Lup leading Taako so he can respond with a flurry of exclamation points, question marks, and heart-eye emojis. He only trips once, which is pretty impressive given the uneven staircase and the phone glued to his face, and Lup manages to yank him back on balance pretty quickly. Their gaggle doesn’t take long to reach the third floor, and then they see their lord and savior, Barold J Bluejeans, standing at the top of the stairs like a benevolent deity come to save them from the hell that is pre-finals cramming.

Lup throws herself into her boyfriend’s arms, shrieking, “How did you guys manage this?”

“Our lab got done early, so we’ve been here for almost eight hours now,” Kravitz says, because Barry’s mouth is a little occupied by Lup’s mouth.

Lup pulls back. “Wasn’t the cadaver lab today?”

“Yeah,” Barry says, and he doesn’t even have the decency to look mildly grossed out by the fact that he totally saw a whole bunch of dead bodies that morning.

“That’s morbid and gross,” Taako says, but doesn’t look too put out about it. 

“How long do we have the room for?” Merle asks.

Kravtiz looks mildly sheepish. “Well, I kind of booked it until closing time, as it were.”

Taako’s eyes go round. “Baby, you’re about to get smooched.”

So they unload stacks of books that they haven’t opened all semester and fight over the outlets to charge their laptops, and they spend what feels like a hundred years in that study room. After a while Lucretia’s shift at the front desk ends and she drags herself upstairs to join them. Taako falls asleep for about half an hour before Lup tugs on his braid to wake him up. Killian and Carey spend a while bickering about the human circulatory system. Barry and Kravitz give Merle and Magnus a very, very in-depth description of what they got up to in their cadaver lab that morning. It’s all very homey, very peaceful, and for a split second, Magnus almost has faith that they’ll all pass their finals.

At the end of the night they drag themselves back to the Tres Horny Boys estate because it’s snowing and their dorm is closest, and Magnus ends up with Carey and Killian in his bed and the twins and their respective boyfriends in the bunk below. Merle somehow manages to get his entire bed to himself, and Lucretia takes the couch, even though Magnus begs her not to. 

Come Monday, they’ll all probably be dead, but for now, they’re alright.


End file.
